Asterisk

I posted this video last November but it seems appropriate today, on what would have been Harvey Milk’s 79th birthday.

From a speech he gave in 1978:

Harvey Milk was assassinated later that year. The fight continues three decades later.

Two votes separated the winners from the losers in the New Hampshire House today. This time, we’re on the losing side. The Washington Blade is reporting that the bill requested by the governor to assure that religious institutions won’t be required to officiate same-sex weddings has failed by a vote of 188-186.

A similar bill had previously passed in the House by a similarly slim margin. My question: Which of the unnecessary changes that their side requested convinced them to change their votes?

The House later voted to return the bill to committee, leading to a re-vote sometime in the next two weeks.

Congratulations, New Hampshire! You win the Drama Queen award!

The fight against the military’s absurd Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy continues to rage, this time as MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow brings us the case of Air Force Lt. Colonel Victor Fehrenbach, an 18-year veteran with an exemplary record and nine commendations for 88 missions, including major missions in the immediate wake of 9/11 and in Iraq. Just two years shy of retirement and two weeks before he was scheduled to re-deploy, the Air Force is firing him for being gay.

Lt. Colonel Fehrenbach is added to the ever-growing list of servicemembers fired for the crime of being gay. The list also includes:

• Air Force (Reserves) Maj. Margaret Witt
• Army Second Lt. Sandy Tsao
• Army (Reserves) First Lt. Daniel Choi
• Kansas Army National Guard Lt. Amy Brian
• Navy ROTC member Todd Belok

This list is just the cases I’ve heard of since President Obama, who during the campaign was boldly vowed to stop DADT, took office. There are 13,000 more honorable servicemembers who have been removed from service to their country because our representatives in Washington, DC won’t remove an obviously unjust law. They won’t act, they won’t say when they’re going to act, they won’t even say if they’re going to act.

Mr. President and other supporters of DADT, you are putting American troops in danger. Next time a soldier is sent home in a pine box, remember: You did this.

If President Obama has been working behind the scenes to get Don’t Ask Don’t Tell repealed, he’s certainly in no rush. This just came over the wire from the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon says it has no plans to repeal the don’t ask-don’t tell policy for gay troops.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Tuesday that the military’s top leaders have only had initial discussions with the White House about whether gay troops should be open about their sexuality.

Under current rules, openly gay troops can be discharged from the U.S. military.

Morrell said the White House has not asked for the 1993 policy to be scrapped.

“I do not believe there are any plans under way in this building for some expected, but not articulated, anticipation that don’t ask-don’t tell will be repealed,” Morrell told reporters at the Pentagon.

President Barack Obama committed during the 2008 presidential campaign to moving to end the Clinton administration-era policy.

The 1993 law was enacted as a compromise between openly gay people serving in the armed forces and those opposed to gays in uniform.

Morrell said Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen both have discussed the issue with Obama.

“They’re aware of where the president wants to go on this issue, but I don’t think that there is any sense of any immediate developments in the offing on efforts to repeal don’t ask-don’t tell,” Morrell said.

In his fuel efficiency photo op today, the president said, “The status quo is no longer acceptable.”

I guess that doesn’t extend to civil rights.

After my post on the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell lawsuit of Major Margaret Witt this morning, I thought it’d be a good idea to give an extremely brief profile to bring us all up to speed.

Maj. Witt, an Air Force reservist flight and operating room nurse represented by the ACLU, is twice decorated, with the Air Medal for evacuating wounded troops in the Middle East and separately with the Air Force Commendation Medal for saving a Department of Defense worker.

Major Witt received the SLDN Courage Award earlier this year.

According to the SLDN, Maj. Witt’s peers in the Air Force explicitly declared that her presence did not harm morale or cause problems with “unit cohesion”.

Witt went to great lengths to keep her military colleagues from knowing she was gay: She and her then-partner lived across the state border from her base.

But judging from comments from Air Force personnel who served alongside Witt, they wouldn’t have cared anyway. In legal documents, they said that what hurt morale was seeing her get booted out.

Major Faith Mueller said of Witt, “She plays an important role in ensuring the good order, morale and cohesion of our unit. … I can say with confidence that her presence in the U.S. Air Force greatly enhances our squadron’s combat efficiency and readiness.”

According to the ACLU, at the time of Maj. Witt’s discharge in early 2006, the Air Force Reserves had 121 vacancies for flight nurses at her rank.